Borrowing
by tastewithouttalent
Summary: "Dark eyes drop from his face to his shoulders, Rogue's forehead creases in confused disapproval, and the curve of his mouth draws into the beginning of a frown." Sting borrows Rogue's shirt and Rogue doesn't protest as much as he ought.


Sting's in the middle of a fight when Rogue comes into the room.

On the one hand, it's been a while since the last save point, and it would be nice to hit a new one before he pauses. But on the other hand he's losing, and pretty badly, and more to the point he can't trust himself to _not_ be distracted. So he hits the Start button to pause the movement on the screen, looks up so he can stare at the pale line of the other's neck under his tied-up hair.

Rogue looks softer at home, Sting is discovering. In general Rogue is calmer around the blond, quick to rise to argument when needled but just as quick to cool off, letting things go as rapidly as they rise to the surface. And it is true that Sting doesn't always get him home before he gets Rogue half-out of his usual clothes, that the multiple layers of fabric are no real barrier to him at all. But there's a difference between the poor lighting in a shadowed street corner or the frown of irritation in the guild and right now, with just a t-shirt to cover the line of Rogue's shoulders and his mouth soft and idle while he considers the basket of laundry in the corner.

"Do you think I should wash those?" he starts, rubbing against the smooth line at the back of his neck. Sting tracks the movement, tilts his head so he can watch the shift of Rogue's fingers; he's just thinking about reaching out to replace the other's touch with his own, or maybe to tug him in by the edge of his shirt, when Rogue looks up at him. Dark eyes drop from his face to his shoulders, Rogue's forehead creases in confused disapproval, and the curve of his mouth draws into the beginning of a frown. "Is that _my_ shirt?"

"Huh?" Sting is reaching after all, sliding forward so he can stretch for Rogue's skin. The question comes suddenly, too fast for understanding for a moment; he has to look down, blink at the grey fabric across his chest for a moment, before he knows the answer to the question. "Oh. Yeah."

Rogue makes a plaintive noise, a little whine of protest. "Take it _off_, Sting."

"Why?" Sting's just winding his fingers into the edge of Rogue's t-shirt, about to gain a handhold when Rogue slaps his hand away. "You're not wearing it."

"What's wrong with your _own_ clothes?" Rogue looks more confused than upset, his frown edged with lack of understanding rather than anger. Sting sits up properly, slides forward enough that he can grab at Rogue's waist again, catch the other's wrist this time when he tries to push his touch away.

"They're not as comfortable as yours." Rogue isn't trying very hard to pull away; when Sting tugs at his arm the other capitulates enough to take a step in closer, although his mouth is still pouting around a frown. "And they don't smell like you."

"It's a clean shirt," Rogue says. He's close enough now that Sting can reach up to catch his fingers in the tie of his ponytail and start to slide the hold loose. "It shouldn't smell like anything."

"It does though." Sting drags the tie free, loops it over his fingers while he pushes up the edge of Rogue's t-shirt to touch the warmth of the other's skin under his clothes. "Everything you own smells a little like you." He presses his nose into Rogue's side, breathes in deeply. "It's nice."

"Give me my hairtie back," Rogue says, but he's still not pulling away. With his hand up against Rogue's side Sting can feel the tension melting out of the other's body as he breathes into the worn-soft fabric of Rogue's shirt, the fabric infused with the same impossible smoothness all Rogue's clothes have.

"Shouldn't we share everything?" Sting points out, pulling his arm away and out of reach as Rogue tries to retrieve the elastic from his fingers. "Since we live together now, really it's _our_ shirt."

"It's been a _week_," Rogue complains. "And just because we're existing in the same space doesn't mean you have a right to everything in it."

"Don't be selfish." Sting bumps his head in harder, sighs against Rogue's shirt. He's half-expecting a push, but when fingers land against his head they're gentle, more of a stroke than a shove, and when he nuzzles against Rogue's waist there's a tiny sound of pleasure over his head. "I'm not hurting anything."

"My clothes are going to end up smelling like _you_," Rogue complains, but when Sting glances up he catches the pull of a smile at the other's lips, amusement and affection spilling into his expression in equal parts.

"_Good_." The fingers slide down against his neck, Rogue's eyes focus gentle on Sting's face, and Sting's words fall out of teasing and into sincerity before he means them to. "We won't be able to tell your stuff apart from mine. We'll just be one thing."

"We'll be one _mess_," but Rogue's voice is soft too, tender and warm as the fingers dipping under the collar of his own shirt to stroke against Sting's shoulder.

"Don't act like you regret moving in together," Sting orders. "You'll never convince me."

"I guess there's no point in trying, then." Rogue turns in, settles his other hand against the first on Sting's skin, and Sting doesn't have to look up to see his smile.

He does anyway. It's worth it to see the pleasure on Rogue's lips, the shy delight in the shadow behind his eyes. When Sting starts to grin he doesn't realize it's an echo, doesn't think about it at all. Matching Rogue is easier than breathing, as easy as it was to forget the lines between _Rogue's_ and _Sting's_ when they started to fill the apartment with _ours_.

It's easiest when they're together, after all.


End file.
